Rads and Ectoplasm
by artemide68
Summary: There's a whole chunk of Boston from an alternate universe floating out in the ghost zone. It's empty and silent and seems to pump enough radiation out to push any ghost away. When Danny, Sam and Tucker happen to come across it, they witness the moment in which that chunk got ripped straight out of it's own reality
1. Chapter 1

The ghost zone didn't work like normal space did.

Things kept moving around, distances shortened and dilated. Nevertheless, Danny's research had gradually found a method to map it. He had figured out the ghost zone worked by anchor points, domains or 'realms' of incredibly concentrated ecto-power, acting as static, immovable points in space, as gravitational points of reference for the constantly changing time and space of everything else. This discovery had gotten him thinking that he could work a way of mapping out the dimension, instead of simply relying on his unnatural instincts to find things.

It was a small pet project that came mostly from seeking distraction. He was now 17 and had gained a way better hold on his powers, Vlad and him were on a permanent truce after the fruit loop had gone through some 'character development' (Short for Danny delivering him a crushing defeat), and for some reason the ghost residents now respected him. Frostbite had mentioned something about him defeating Pariah Dark, but he didn't get it. He wasn't about to protest though, especially with the ghosts recognizing Amity as his 'territory' and finally leaving it alone. The guys in white had been court ordered and dismantled for "destruction of property, breach of rights and idiotic waste of taxpayers money" now that a certain fruit loop wasn't backing them anymore or pulling strings. The media has subsequently stopped harassing him too. These days, he was simply the town mascotte, helping out every now and then with some minor problems.

Unfortunately, this development had gotten Danny restless. No fights meant that he was stuck coping with himself. With what he was. With what his power meant and what eventually his parents and the world might have to discover; Sam and Tucker told him he was just a human with ghost powers, made him feel like he was still a normal kid, but he knew that was a lie. It was just a bubble he was comfortable in… one day it would pop, and he wasn't sure he was ready for it.

It had become evident to him one day when Tucker had made fun of him for still not growing a beard. He had started noticing a myriad other details, like how tucker had gotten taller than him, like how he still had a baby face and small shoulders and a wimpy stutter in his stride. He'd gotten to sleep that night incredibly worried and a bit angry. The next morning, the first trace of a black stubble had grown on his chin.

A few months later, another jab at his lack of puberty, and the next morning, he had needed to actually shave. But it wasn't gradual, and his parents had noticed. Wondered about the odd 'growth spurts'. So one day, Danny, peeved and feeling a bit experimental, had gone to sleep wishing he looked like the day of the accident.

The next morning, he did.

He had managed to call himself sick and hide the change for the day, hadn't told Sam and Tucker yet, but he knew he would have to cross that bridge at some point. While he looked like an average seventeen year old, broad shoulders, pronounced, angular face, he knew he had stopped aging about 3 years ago. He had stopped aging entirely, or having a body that behaved the laws of physics, for that matter. He wasn't human, he was an interchangeable being that constantly shifted between energy and matter, and his cells could age and de-age on command.

Every now and then he had wished he could tell Sam about it, but just as his mouth went to speak the words, he'd remember the day of the accident, and the days afterwards. The way Sam's face contorted every time he'd have a breakdown over his 'weirdness'. The way she looked away when she thought he wasn't looking. Sam blamed herself, and he knew that in some ways, Tucker blamed himself too. There was no point in sharing this. He had to keep silent. He'd age with them and.. and then.. well he would figure it out as it went. Maybe he would move into the ghost zone for good… he didn't know. But it was worth studying the place at least, to get an idea or two.

His friends had found it hard to believe that an airhead like him would suddenly throw himself so hard into ecto-research, and mapping out the ghost zone (the infini-map got you there, but wasn't exactly reliable for anything else). Still, they had been pretty excited about it overall. It beat lazing around Sam's place all day.

"Don't worry Sam, I'm fine over here! I haven't met a single friendly or hostile ghost in hours, if anything our mapping project couldn't be going better!"

Danny's voice echoed into the comms. He was in his ghost form alone, floating in a sea of endless green, with nothing on the horizon. He wasn't lost though. A perk of him being the way he was happened to be that he could always 'sense' his way back.

Still, He hadn't been completely honest with Sam. The lack of an anchor point for this long was beginning to worry him. The lack of any type of ghosts whatsoever worried him a lot more. The Ghost Zone wasn't exactly 'crowded', but he had never seen it this empty. It had him on edge. When the ghost zone was empty, it usually meant something would chase the ghosts off.

As if reading his thoughts, Sam replied through the comms. "Bullshit Danny, no ghosts doesn't mean the place is safe." Tucker's voice simmered into the channel. "Danny, Sam's right man, something is seriously whack here. Your suit sensors are not picking up any sign of spectral activity in a fifty-mile radius, and you're in the Ghost Zone. "

Danny frowned at the news. Something was definitely off, but if that was the case, well that was even more of a reason not to back down. "All right, alright, you got me… something in this place is off… But guys, if something is threatening the ghost zone, I need to find out what it is. This could be serious! Besides, Tuck can tell me if there are hostiles or weird energy readings in the a…"

Something.. faint but.. powerful caught his senses and stopped all train of thought. A few seconds of radio silence, alternated by small static noise. Ecto-interference? Currents were picking up, but he couldn't sense a storm.

"Danny, Over, Danny don't you fucking dare cut off.. Danny are you still there?"

"Shit, yeah, sorry Sam. I just… got taken by surprise. I sense an anchor point. It's really far but it should take me half an hour to fly there. It feels.. off.. kinda pressuring…"

"Danny maybe you should wait. We should come there with backup. You're really far and we can't help you if anything happens to you right now."

Danny muffled a groan. He didn't really want to get Sam and Tucker over there. Sure, humans had certain advantages in the ghost zone, but it was still a pretty deadly place for them. He cringed for a second, realizing he hadn't considered himself a human in that reasoning at all. No. He had no time to start an inner existential debate.

Besides, Sam and Tucker would put themselves in harm's way regardless of whether he decided to go off on his own. He had tried to cut them off in the past and it had always gone way worse than when he let them tag along. It's not that he didn't respect their strength, hell, they had saved his glowing ass more times that he could count, but he had nothing to loose. He was already dead and apparently going to un-live forever. They.. They had everything to loose. Or maybe they were the last thing he had that he could loose himself.

"Danny, stop being a bonehead and wait there for us."

"Wrong undead Sam, definitely not a skeleton"

"Ugh, Fine Casper, just wait! We're getting the Spectre-speeder, Should be there in about an hour."

"…Guys, I can't just stay still here while I wait for you. With no anchor points nearby, this place has really strong ecto-currents. I'm gonna keep moving towards the place I sensed before. Rendez-vous there?"

Danny smirked at Sam's small curse and begrudging acknowledgement. He promised he would not rush in, and started moving towards the horizon.

In just 15 minutes, he had visuals.

"Guys I got the place in sight. It seems to be a chunk of city that got ripped out of somewhere. Bunch of skyscrapers, really weird designs... They're all pretty broken up. Still don't sense any ghosts. Tucker, what are the sensors telling you?"

"Nothing here, dude. Place might as well be a ghost town! Ha! Get it? OW What'd you do that for!"

Danny let out a smile, knowing Sam had just elbowed him.

"I'm gonna get closer then."

"Danny.." He could sense worry "All right just.. keep the comms open." He mumbled a yes, feeling guilty that he was worrying them. He really just wanted to make sure things were safe before they reached him.

"I'm close enough to land now. It looks to be bunch of ruins. I don't sense any ghosts and it doesn't look like a spectral domain either. It's.. uhm.. very retro." He added, floating in front of one of the signs clinging to a skyscraper. It was covered in rust, but he could still discern a pin-up girl in the design holding a weird prop gun that looked straight out of a 1950s sci-fi movie. "But there's modern stuff too, just with a vintage twist." He mumbled, noticing the scientific apparel through one of the skyscraper windows. He began floating towards the ground, looking carefully at the streets and the towering buildings above him. The place looked almost.. reverent.. in it's silence. He didn't sense any ghosts but he could sense a pressure on himself, and.. something, some forms of spirits, or collective consciousness, in every metal panel, rusted window and brick wall. He set up and focused, trying to sharpen his senses while he waited, trying to let the pressure… the presences... into his mind.

For a second he thought he heard them telling a story. A story about the end of the world.

"It's just a gut feeling. Your ghost sense isn't like this." He muttered to himself as he rubbed his forehead, which was now aching, and looked around, noticing a small breeze in the air, brushing his hair and carrying powdered rust through the streets. That was weird, the ghost zone didn't actually have natural wind.

The comms opened up. "Danny, We've got the place in sight ahead, should land in five minutes." Danny smiled

"I hope you guys got your tetanus shots, lots of rust and debris, you don't wanna get cut." He added, snapping himself out of his thoughts. "I landed, place seems safe for now, you guys probably didn't need to make the trip." He smirked at Sam getting mad at him for not waiting around. "Come on Sam, you were overthinking it. This place is probably just empty cause there's only one anchor point and it looks really shitty and desolate. Who would wanna camp out here?" He added, as he started walking towards where he felt the breeze was coming from. Might as well explore while he waited around.

5 minutes after, he would get hit in the back of his head by a familiar tecno-boomerang and would be subsequently slapped by a very angry Sam Manson, who weirdly enough was wearing a rad-protective hazmat suit.

Tucker on the other hand, also donning a hazmat, had gotten out of the spectre speeder and completely zoned out of the drama, focusing on his PDA readings.

"Hey Danny, so you know how everything in the ghost zone is technically radioactive, but somehow doesn't affect humans. Uh.. I mean, well, don't worry, you should be safe cause ghosts just get mildly destabilized by it, but me and sam suited up cause there's actual non-ecto radiation here. Explains the rust and the lack of campers I guess, but catch this! It's been gradually decreasing from the moment you landed here. It shouldn't decay this quickly. Did you notice anything odd since you landed?"

Danny blinked, and looked around the area he was in. Didn't it look.. More brown? Before he had landed? Also, the pressure he was sensing had lowered a bit, but not by much "I don't really know Tuck, but it feels like there was more rust before. Also I'm kinda sensing something in the buildings but it doesn't feel like a person and it's giving me a headache" He rubbed his temples.

Tucker nodded. "That's normal man, if this place is radioactive, keeping your ghost form stable should need more brain juice, also explains why ghosts don't like it here. This might actually be a goo slaughterhouse for the weaker ones" He smirked, but flinched, as Danny looked really unsettled "Oh, right Uhm, sorry dude. Was there anything else?"

Danny tried to shrug it off. "Well, I felt wind coming from the direction I was walking towards before Sam slapped me." He smirked. "Could be a natural portal, I don't know. I think we should check it out. But like if this place is radioactive it might be dangerous for you guys." He added as a worried afterthought.

Sam groaned "Danny, we got suits, if anything, you risk being the one melting into goo. It's a good thing you're too damn powerful, it compensates for you being clueless literally all the time." She poked him, still half-mad. Danny didn't take it personally. He knew she was just worried.

"Okay. Okay. We all know I'm a dumbass. It's been established since I chose to head into a ghost portal and completely didn't notice the fact I was pressing a big 'on' button." He said sarcastically, but with a hint of hurt. "You guys are here now though, I know of the danger, can we just please get on with it? There's gotta be a portal here or something and if it keeps leaking radiation like Tucker said, it could be dangerous for the weaker ghosts in the zone. We gotta shut it off." He added as he turned around and walked towards the breeze. Sam frowned at Danny's retreating back. Tucker eyed her and shook his head "Let's just go Sam." He said, monitoring his PDA and moving forward. The three of them walked along the debris in silence.

It was as if the longer they followed the breeze, the newer things got. Rust gradually disappeared from the buildings, the debris cleared itself, and the cars on the street gradually became better parked and orderly. The followed the trail of restoration until they found themselves at the center of a main square.

"Woah." All there of them said in unison as they walked (And floated) into better view for themselves. In front of them was a silent yet idyllic jetson-like utopia. Shiny metal skyscrapers, Old styled yet gleaming fast looking-cars, Glowing soda advertisements, a metal robot in a newspaper stand, looking decisively turned off. Danny got close to the stand and grabbed a newspaper, reading the title

'Boston, October 23, 2077'

'Are We on the Brink of Atomic War? China Promises Immediate Attack After Tensions Over US Victory in Anchorage'

An atomic war? The thought.. the implications for himself… made him shudder. But something didn't quite click. Was this.. the future? Or the past…

He got snapped out of his musings by Tucker "Hey! It's Saying here the radiation is completely gone now. Weird huh? I'm still not taking off my helmet"

Sam got both of their attention. "Forget about that! Guys, come over here."

She was near a giant, perfectly polished, abstract metal statue in the centre of the square. In front of it was an oblong cylinder that had a label on top of it saying 'Pulowski Preservation Services'. It was open, or well, someone had opened it. Inside, there was tear in space. A window into another world.

"Looks like you needed our help coming here after all, since you know, I found the natural portal." Sam Smirked behind the hazmat mask. "No way you airhead would have figured it out."

Danny frowned. "Sam, I'd like to remind you I've got ghost powers and I can sense these kind of things." He said, without pressing things much though, cause he hadn't really managed to sense anything until he had gotten close. "But.. Thanks. This should save some time…. It looks powerful though.. I don't know if I can.. close it.."

His speech faded off as he stared transfixed at what was happening on the other side. It was the same square the trio was standing on. People were in the streets, just opposite them. They seemed to be dressed in an odd style, with 1950s fashion but full of features that belonged to an episode of the jetsons. They were walking normally when Danny had spoken, but now? They had started running. They could hear, coming from beyond the portal, the faint howl of sirens.

He didn't notice Sam snatch the newspaper that he was still holding under his hand. She read the headline, alarmed. "Hey guys.. what do you think happened here?"

"Something bad" Danny's gut feeling told him, and he voiced out loud without thinking. He remembered the voices, what he though they told him. The omen. The sirens were picking up and now they could hear faint screams. The pressure in the back of his mind felt harder. He could almost feel it again, unspoken whispers warning him through the rust. "Guys, I don't think it's safe here, I think we should lea…"

A Bright flash of light blinded all three of them for what felt like an eternity. Despite coming through the portal, It shined all across the whole city. When Danny was able to see again, his glowing green eyes fell transfixed onto a mushroom cloud, covering most of the sky above the square, on the other side of the portal.

"Uhm, guys, radiation levels came back. They're growing stronger by the second" Tucker, who had come to just a second before him thanks to his darkened visor, who had understood exactly what was going on but was too frightened to address it head on, had added, sheepish and half frozen in place.

"HOLD ON!" Danny yelled, grabbing both of them in a blur and flying away at ridiculous speeds, fear zapping him into a jerk-sweep motion. Danny was clueless but he wasn't stupid, he knew what tucker meant, the natural portal behind them was still open and what he had observed across it was a nuclear detonation. He might not have been a scientist but his obsession with space and stars had caused him to know quite a bit about the nuclear reactions that went on inside them, and he knew that he only had precious milliseconds before the blast would hit all three of them fully. Even if he turned Sam and Tucker intangible, he wasn't sure he had the control or strength needed to protect them from that level of radiation, and he didn't want to find out. Passing through solid objects? No problem. Avoiding tampering at an atomic level? That's a bit much. Besides that was assuming the radiation wouldn't destabilize him enough first to cause him to drop the intangibility. Think, Fenton. Think. If only you ever forced that fruitloop to teach you how to goddamn teleport.

He felt the searing heat behind him and his mind went blank.

Time felt slowed down as he realized that his speed was no match. If he didn't do something incredibly stupid, quickly, he would melt and Sam and Tucker would die.

In a cold, unfeeling fraction of a second, he knew what he had to do.

He threw both his friends towards the edge of the square. He saw Sam's eyes on him as he moved his lips, saying 'sorry', and then let his eyes glow the most intense blue his friends had seen as far. He needed his ice core. He needed to make a dome around the portal, and he needed to make it as thick and dense as lead. But he didn't have time to focus on shapes, on putting things in front or behind or making them hollow or…. He just needed ice around the portal. A thick layer, thick enough to block at least some radiation, cold enough to slow the chain reaction. It would be okay. Ghosts melted when exposed to high radiation, but they would reform. Sam and Tucker would help him get back. He would be all right. He would not make Sam cry.

In a bright flash of blue light, just as the fire threatened to reach his friends, everything around Danny became frozen solid, stopping right at the space in which Sam and Tucker were thrown. The Whole Square encased in a dome of Ice so thick nothing could be seen through it, except for a bright light at the core, shining prismatically across like the dome had diamond facets.

Then the light became brighter and brighter, and the ice began to show small cracks over a surface that kept repairing itself. Sam and Tucker, just coming back to from the shockwave and being thrown around, started scrambling away, confused at to what had happened, then stunned in realization, watching as the ice showed more marked cracks and the light grew. The ice kept forming over the cracks, as if trying to cage a beast made of light and Sam concluded with horror that Danny, from within, was still pouring energy into the ice, strengthening it from being blasted away. She screamed his name.

With a massive guttural sound, a sonic boom suddenly erupted from the core of the dome, this time not pushing things outward, but pulling things in an unstoppable suctioning force. The ice began cracking and disintegrating as it fell into the portal from the inside. While tucker grabbed onto the nearest lamppost for dear life, Sam let go of hers to run towards Danny, whose silhouette had fainted at the edge of the dome, frozen solid in his own power.

"Danny wake up! You gotta phase through the ice! Danny! Danny Wake up Please!" There were tears in her eyes now.

But there was no way for her to break through the dome, made of technically unbreakable ghostly ice. Only something that could destabilize ectoplasm would be able to break through, something that was currently consuming it from within.

As the chunk Danny was stuck in started dislodging, and falling into the bright light, Sam cried out.

"NO!"

She reached out through the cracks of ice, latching onto Danny's prison, and felt herself be pulled into the portal with it, but another ice shard hit her on the shoulder and caused her to loose grip, throwing her away. She was wailing now, rushing towards the fixture but… as the final chunks of Danny's power fell in, the suction stopped.

And the portal disappeared.

Far far away, in the central anchor point of the ghost zone and an eclectic, ticking spectral domain, A ghost known for being the 'master of all time' dropped his staff.


	2. Chapter 2

Nora Taylor used to practice law before all this. She hadn't been in the game in a while, but she was going to come back after Shaun's birth. She was going to defend the rights of the people in a country that kept trampling them by selling the individual to corporations and using war as an excuse for its measures. She was going to make a change in society, and she was going to protect the weak, and she was going to raise a beautiful, smart, young boy with Nate, the love of her life.

Yeah right.

She couldn't help but let a loud laugh course through her whole body as she went followed her thoughts, standing at the edge of the glowing sea. Nick Valentine was beside her, silent and eyeing her thoroughly, but not looking an inch more surprised than usual. He was used to Nora's chagrin. He wasn't quite as human as everyone else around him, but he would have eaten his mangled Stetson hat if he didn't know Nora like the back of his trench coat by now. The lass had increasingly become more and more haunting since the day she had first stepped foot in his office with an impossible request. He couldn't even fathom what kind of mental process one had to go through to shift from loving mother in a (relatively) tender world to one of the most ruthless, dangerous wastelanders currently in the commonwealth, but for Nora to make the cut, something had to have broken up or fizzled out in the central processing unit. Not that it didn't make her any less good of a friend, or human being, no. Just a little trigger-happy and with the occasional psychotic outburst.

Nora knew what nick was thinking whenever he gave her the long looks. She chuckled, seemingly unparsed by her own inner misery.

"Ready to get out there again Nick? Haven't set foot in this place in a while, didn't really have much of an excuse to visit since our friend Virgil went all human again, I forgot how charming it was." She chuckled again, hysterically. Nick kept being silent, near her, waiting her to calm down. She exhaled, and ran a hand through dirty, short red hair "All right all right, sorry for the little show there, it's just been, what, one year? Wow." She exhaled, composing herself inside her rad-resistant power armour. Nick nodded, making a small underhanded but affectionate comment about loosing screws. She didn't need to specify. It had been one year since the both of them had traveled all the way into the glowing sea to find Virgil, a super mutant scientist. In a few months time, it would have been one year since she destroyed the institute, and murdered her own son.

They were off to the glowing sea on a mission from the minutemen, a now growing force for good within the commonwealth. Nora hadn't taken the position of leadership Preston had offered her, but she still helped out from time to time, made sure the group didn't mess around again like before. She trusted Preston, but the guy was still way too emotional to handle things on his own.

There had been a sudden huge afflux of children of atom pilgrims, coming from all sides or the commonwealth and beyond, converging into the place of worship Nora understood as ground zero, Atom's Crater. Most of them were harmless, but many had disrupted commonwealth settlements by acting violent towards non-believers, or bringing in unwanted radiation. Some travelled with chained glowing ones as offerings and items of worship, and more than a few times those ghouls had gotten loose, ending up in a bloodbath and a lot of radiation poisoning. Nora had dealt with the children before, and had found them mostly harmless, but these numbers had started to make her worried. The crazy worshippers might be weak from radiation sickness half the time, and hallucinating the other half, but now they were crazy and with an army, one that was hard to fight, since it was bunkered down in a place most people would be mad to even try approach.

She had popped her helmet on and moved forwards. They had traded a few essential quips as they entered the green storm. At the end of a day's walk, something would shut both of their mouths entirely.

The crater of Atom wasn't just a crater any longer. It was a small town. She couldn't even fathom where the children were able to scavenge that many supplies in a radioactive desert, but there it was… If these people hadn't multiple times proved to be completely insane, she would have even felt some sort of awe, or innate respect, for what they were able to accomplish.

Two men had stopped them in front of some sort of gates. They had erected a wall around the town borders, which Nora assumed wasn't to protect from fellow men, since the only people roaming the glowing sea were the children themselves. Deathclaws, on the other hand, might've been increasingly attracted by the growing 'food nest'.

"Hail Atom, travelers. You come to worship his holy vessel?"

Nick and Nora had given each other a quick comedic glance.

"We've come to meet with your leader, Mother Isolde. They know me, We've met a year ago. Although… she's never really said anything about a holy vessel? What, has she been up somebody's pants lately? Cause if so good for her." Nora added commented in a half sarcastic tone. The guard dislodged his mandible, looking personally affronted.

"Would you dare speak heresy against the mother and holy vessel? Atoms fury will rain upon all that.."

He was stopped by Nick Valentine's loud, raspy groan.

"Remind me of why I travel with you again?" He said, his voice grouchier than usual as he stepped up in front of Nora, trying to hide her as much as possible

"Look Buddy, you've got to forgive my partner here, she talks a big mouth but could probably use a bit of atoms wisdom." He put extra stress on the last part, turning around to glare at her. "You see, me and my partner here don't mean you guys and your god no harm. We are just here to trade a few words with the good mother, representing the minutemen. It's been a long time since I've seen this many children out in the commonwealth, and since we are neighbours and all I think we oughta figure out a way to help each other, don't you?"

"As far as I'm concerned heretics like you should be banned from the holy site." The guard hissed. "But we shall see what Mother has to say." He nudged his head towards his radiation blaster, then motioned at the duo to follow him through the gates.

Not everyone in the village looked like the usual children of atom worshipper. Some seemed to be new, and had just begun loosing their hair. Some were actual children, which made Nora's stomach turn in disgust. Children had no way of making a crazy religious choice for themselves. Were these guys recruiting orphans and sending them to their deaths?

"I've seen some of these people before, in the commonwealth. Pretty bold move to choose to leave everything behind for this." Nick had commented off handedly as they approached the center of the crater, giving Nora the quick glance that usually meant he suspected something rotten. Nora couldn't be more inclined to agree. These 'new people' seemed to be there of their own will, but why such a sudden conversion to such a crazy religion. This village had walls now. They might have kept bad things out, but they could also hold things in. Did it have to do with something this.. vessel.. the guard was talking about.

"Atom's will is great, and he has blessed us with a grand gift. Even the stubborn nonbelievers can now see into his glory. Look for yourself." The guard added smugly, as they approached the central crater.

Surrounded by dozens of men and women in prayer, was a pool of radioactive water Nora was familiar with. The core of the crater. Ground Zero. What she wasn't familiar with was the pedestal of glowing trinkets emerging from the waters at the core's center, upholding something that was objectively just plain weird.

It was the most vivid blue crystal she had ever seen. She would almost have confused it for ice if not for the fact that she hadn't seen actual ice ever since she'd gotten out of her cryo-pod and that, well, the crystal seemed to be glowing. The most stunning thing though, was not the glow in the ice itself, but the bright, ethereal white light, outlining a human figure, trapped inside the crystalline obelisk.

"Behold, foreigners, Atoms holy corpse. That is the vessel all here come to worship." The guard phrased slowly, stopping in his step reverently. "You will be quiet and wait now, for Mother Isolde is about to give a sermon. We will meet her as she is finished."

Nora remembered Isolde. She had looked humble, crazy of course, but reasonable enough. That was not the way she looked now, as she walked out of a balcony, above 'the relic'. What she looked now, was possessed. It was as if something within that glowing crystal had caused her to snap, well, snap more than she had already snapped before. Nora had been on the brink of loosing it a few times herself, and quite frankly, seeing Isolde's face like that was driving it home a little too much.

As she had reached the edge of the balcony, she had raised her hands to the sky, her long green robes flowing across her arms like wings. The whole town had quieted down, leaving only the sound of a few chants lost in the radioactive wind.

"Six months ago, dear children, a few of our devoted found the Holy Vessel within the glowing pools of the west"

"Six Months ago, we were lost in his glow, dear children, we were asking for his love. We were battling the non-believers, suffering to prove our faith. But we were unseen, unconnected, unloved. Yet fret not, for Atom is great, and his love infinite. For now, Atom has found us!"

She paused, looking towards the sky, and lowering her arms onto the crowd.

"Six months ago, I have gazed into Atom's endless green eyes. Atom himself showed me a vision, through his body. He has given us a great gift, and bestowed upon us a great duty. For he will descend upon the earth, and he shall descend within this vessel. Dear children Atom wishes to live among us. Together, he wills to guide us through Division. Thus we must worship him, until he is resurrected. We must sacrifice and appease his demand, so that he may walk amongst us."

At this point, Isolde was visibly shaking.

"He has spoken to me. He feeds on our love, asks for our pain, and we must answer to him. Each day we must. None will be like us in history. We are Atom's chosen! We shall worship him, we shall save him, and he will save us!"

And with that, she lifted some form of staff into the air, and the crowd exploded in a huge roar.

"Tomorrow, we begin the final ritual of awakening. Bless you All! May Atom be with you!" She erupted madly, retreating away from the balcony. The crowd remained in unrest, chanting furiously and making noise with various improvised instruments. The guard escorting Nora and Nick grabbed both of their arms to make sure they would not escape in the chaos, and led them towards the main hub. After waiting for a small time in a separate room, Nora was asked to step out of her power armour. Radiation levels seemed to be lower in the crater, and she didn't want to start shooting just yet, so she begrudgingly accepted after popping a few pills of Rad-X. They were led into the Mother's quarters. She awaited them while sitting. Meditating.

"Welcome, wanderers" She smiled, politely facing them. "I see we have met before, you vanquished the heretic for us, way back. Brother Adam here tells me you have come to bargain for the Minutemen. How lucky for you to be here again, at such a great time of our lord's awakening."

"Well that's a way of putting it" Nick mumbled in the back.

Nora stared down at Isolde. "Lady I have about a million questions more at this point that have absolutely nothing to do with what Preston asked me to do, but yes, let's just say I've come to bargain." She crouched down in front of her, relaxing, completely ignoring the tension in the room.

"I see you've been stacking up quite a community here. Odd place to be at but hey, you guys seem to immune to this stuff, so good for you. Us 'normal'…" She wiggled her fingers as if to say she was not normal at all "…people in the commonwealth though… well, let's just say some of us don't like all this radiation flying around. Some of your caravans have been harming our settlements, and well, we don't really want to start preparing defenses against them if we can help it. We'd rather come to some form of agreement with your pilgrims, you feel? They stay away from our territories, and we make sure the roads to the glowing sea are safe to travel. We could also exchange goods and get some trade going while we are at it. That's just one of a few ideas." She smirked.

Isolde, oddly enough, seemed to be matching Nora's smirk. Except she looked way creepier than what her bloodthirsty counterpart could ever hope to achieve.

"These seem all excellent ideas my child, but I am afraid they will have to wait. Tomorrow is a great day for our community, and none can tell what shall come after it, except for Atom himself"

"Yeah, about that, what the fucking hell was mmhph.."

"I suppose what my partner is trying to say here." Nick interceded again, at this point just plain used to it. "Is that we were surprised at how much your community has grown. We've also managed to see the relic, and hear your speech, and were wondering more about it."

"Ah, so Atoms glow has drawn you in. Not to worry, all can take his path to division, even those lacking human flesh." She eyed him and smiled, ignoring Nick's pronounced frown. "There is not much more I can say that my speech has not already revealed. All questions will be answered tomorrow. Atom has spoken to me, through his demands and his tests I've seen what to do to bring him into this world, and I have chosen to serve him. He is close to resurrection, and tomorrow, he will walk amongst us."

Nora shifted on her feet. She didn't like this. There was no way the children would resurrect their god, but whatever was going to happen, it wasn't gonna end up pretty, and, well, if she could help it she didn't wanna be anywhere around it when it happened.

Except for…

The children she had seen, among the crowd… They would get slaughtered wouldn't they? One way or another, just being in that place without rad x meant radiation poisoning, they were already dying with every… Could she abandon them? It would be that easy now, after what she'd done, wouldn't it?

"Of course you're welcome to stay for the ritual. We may continue our discussion after. Our brothers will prepare your lounging. You must leave me know, I have much to meditate on"

A few reveries later, and a few question that Isolde kept outright dodging, they were brought to a separate room and left alone, asked to wait as the guard would bring back Nora's power armour.

They had been silent with each other, waiting for one to break the ice.

"Nick.." Nora mumbled under her breath

"Oh thank the railroad, I thought you were just gonna let me do the talking." He whispered back.

"You've been great at it so far, constantly interrupting me and everything"

"You're a real piece of work you know? I don't know if you noticed here boss, but these people are straight up insane, and now they seem to think their god will walk on earth. I don't like lying just as much as you, but I can omit a few personal opinions if it gets my gears still grinding underneath my trenchcoat."

"Yeah, yeah. Whatever. You know what we have to do, right?"

"My best guess at this point is that you first chose to run away with your tail between your legs, figuring that these people would accidentally blow themselves up, and then saw the obviously kidnapped children and took a 180 degree angle turn."

"You know me so well."

"So are we rescuing the children and the new recruits? Do we even know if they are here by force?"

"Well, we could always talk to them and find out. Maybe they know what this ritual even is in the first place. Also, what did you think of that.. thing. That was just weird right?"

"Don't tell me you believe in that pigeon's milk. It's probably some rad infused crystal that happened to look like there's a fella inside it. There's lotsa weird stuff like that happening in the wasteland."

"…You're probably right. The radiation must be so concentrated in that thing is probably also what drove the Mother insane. Gosh Nick this is a mess."

"You're telling me, you got my work cut out for me. By the way, we should watch out while we are out in the crater. If some of these people were actually kidnapped, the dear Mother might definitely have sent some goons to babysit us. They could strike at any m…"

Nick's voice fizzled out, his golden eyes turning off. A small electrical device had been lodged in his back, seemingly shorting out his power. Nora turned as fast as she could, but a long sharp needle stabbed her near her neck juncture, and things gradually.. gradually turned to black. 

* * *

Q&A Answering time

People have asked me questions about the pseudo-science I came up with to explain things, and I don't want to reveal too much, because i'd rather the story answer these questions gradually, but I actually did some research on the way i wanted the physics to works before working on the plot. Here's a little info, let's start from the miracle substance, ectoplasm

Ectoplasm is the made up substance that makes up ghosts and the ghost zone. According to my definition, it is a substance that can shift on command from energy to matter without any entropic loss. If you know about physics, you know that all matter is secretly energy, and that is the principle behind nuclear fission and fusion. A shift between energy and matter also explains how ghosts can shapeshift, turn intangible, and a lot of other things.

Ectoplasm also needs psychic energy to command it and shape it between states. That is why ghosts tend to be imprints of old human consciousnesses that passed away. Without psychic energy, Ectoplasm just fades back into the ghost zone. A very powerful ghost is one that can command very concentrated ectoplasm, and has accumulated a huge amount of emotions, thoughts and dreams, and thus will have better ability to control the ectoplasm he's made of. Now, ghosts can't generate psychic energy on their own, they either need to feed from humans, or draw into the power of the ghost zone, which is full of vacant psychic residue.

Danny, being a halfa, can just draw into his human half to feed himself.

Nuclear Fission (Detonation of an atomic bomb) is a process in which matter gets turned into energy irreversibly. This happens through an extremely strong chain reacting collision of particles. Fission interferes with the natural process in which ectoplasm shifts from matter to energy and vice-versa. A ghost needs an extraordinary amount of psychic control over his own ectoplasm to not be afftected by the chain reaction produced by fission.

Therefore, Nuclear radiation affects the ability of ectoplasm to coherently form a ghost, and can turn weaker ghosts into goo (temporarily, if this goo is fed psychic energy and pulled away from the radiation, the ghost can reform). At the same time, a ghost that is well fed and has strong psychic energy, can combat the effects of radiation by carefully keeping his own ectoplasm in shape.

Danny is not entirely made of ectoplasm, but the ectoplasm within him can slowly manipulate everything else in his body, due to this energy to matter conversion. Effectively, this protects him from radiation sickness, and, if he becomes skilled enough at manipulating his energy, one day he could cause, more or less subconsciously, to modify his human cells entirely.

That's all I'm going to say for now ;=)


	3. Chapter 3

Sorry about taking so long to update. I found my muse again  
I wanna say, thinks are getting dark here. I've change dthe story rating from T to M for Graphic Violence. You have been warned

* * *

'The day has come.'

'Atom's will'

'Blood'

'Mother'

'The Institute must be destroyed'

'You said we could trust her!'

'She.. she shot him. What kind of monster shoots her own son!'

'Nora. We've got to go. Come on. Nora!'

'Nora'

'Nora!'

"Nora! Wake Up!"

Nora jolted awake from something sharp and heavy smacking her in the back of her head. She groaned, massaging her scalp, or attempting to. Apparently both of her hands were tied up to something. Tied up together.

"Finally, sleeping beauty decides to join me." A grouchy and disgruntled old voice shook her out of her grogginess. Nick. Her soul felt the veil of fear lift off just a tiny bit. She was dangerous alone, but she was better off with a partner, especially after recent events. She suspected Nick could tell just as much as she did that the 'dangerous alone' part applied to herself just as much as everybody else. There had to be a reason why lately she could not walk out of her office without the old robot or some other companion escort 'casually' offering to tag along. There was a time where she would have felt offended by this babysitting. Now? Well, live in this world enough and you learn pride is the first thing that tends to get you killed.

But it wasn't time to contemplate whether or not being separated from Nick would plant a final nail in her coffin. She had to deal with the present, the fact that she had gotten drugged, bound, and locked up somewhere in the dark next to her partner, whose glowing, haunting yellow eyes happened to be the only light source for her to assess things, such as the fact he had thrown one of his literal screws at her to wake her up. She seemed to be in some form of metal container, with bars separating her from the android. Besides Nick's voice, she could hear muffled chants somewhere outside, beyond thick walls.

"I… uh.. how much irradiated whiskey did I chug? Were there strippers? Must've been kinky if I ended up in chains right after.."

"You know what, with that kinda memory I am almost grateful for my failing synth implants."

"I'm just messing with you. I remember you fizzling out in that antechamber. I'm guessing our questions about Isolde got answered."

"And you're in the mood to make jokes in this situation? I think your bar for humour has reached a new low."

"Well it's either that or get the ugly reminder that we're locked in some dark place and might just get roped into a suicide pact with a glowy rock along with a whole chunk of captive children. How long have we been out anyways?"

"I haven't been really conscious for most of it but my system reports the last log came in about 12 hours ago. Looks like we just made it for Isolde's birthday party."

"Oh great, you know how I love giving other people presents. Violent ones."

"Easy there, Nora. How about you start getting out of those cuffs first." Nick frowned. Nora was always cracking jokes when she was nervous. Getting chatty about violence meant she really had been shaken up. This wasn't good.

He was about to say something when a loud, deafening sound announced the opening of the heavy metal contraption locking them in. The brightness outside blinded them instantly, and the loud echoing of rusty metal parted, introducing a ferocious crowd roar.

Two zealots walked in and tried to grab them by the forearms, but this time Nora wasn't going to go down easily. She took less than a second to bite the first one's hand off. Eliciting a screech from the man, she went for a knee in the nuts next, but she must have still been feeling some of the drug's influence, because she wasn't fast enough to avoid the beating of the second guard's metal club against her ribs. She let go of the first's hand and spit blood, only partly her own. The bitten guard took that as a chance to kick her down, which got nick to try break free and stop him, only to get zapped by an electric rod. Then, between her own curses, Nick's, and the ones of their captors, they both were dragged by the dirt outside the container, onto green, phosphorous ground.

Nora could almost feel the radioactivity seep into her aching thorax, the effects of Rad-X long gone. Great. If she ended up turning into a ghoul because of some cultists, she was going to owe Hancock a whole load of caps. She licked a bloodied lip, and adjusted her eyes to the light.

Outside the metal container turned makeshift prison, was Isolde's glowing pool, with the 'vessel' at the center, looking much brighter than before. Surrounding it, a stadium of crazed followers against a dark green, swirling, smoky sky. Strong winds and dust scraped against her bloody cheeks. She saw a green flash of light and then heard thunder in the sky, against the loud boom of yells and chants. Great, on top of all she had to deal with? A rad-storm was brewing.

"And now my children, so close to his awakening, Behold! These two non-believers, who've been conspiring against us, shall face today the glory of Atom among our brothers and sisters. They will be given a chance to repent! Perhaps they shall be the last sacrifice needed to bring back our lord!"

"Mother.. fucking.." Nora tried to lift her head from the dirt. It proved difficult with a boot of one of the zealots pressing directly against her head, but a bruised rib wasn't gonna stop her. "Listen up you psycho fuckwad excuse for a post-atomic Mother Theresa, You're the one that's conspiring against every single dumb asshole in.."

Her train of thought stopped as the zealot trying to push her down fell under his own feet, failing to contain her jerky movements. But that wasn't the reason she'd stopped. It was because her bloodshot eyes had finally managed to grasp the sights around her.

Dozens of corpses, surrounding her. Some of children. Some of people she had seen as she had first walked in the town. Mutilated. Body parts had been thrown to the sides, fingernails had been removed, teeth had been pulled, cuts were streamlined across bodies and guts were left hanging out in the open.

Then she heard the screams, and she saw, just a little bit further from her, away from the dead piles, a young woman strapped to what seemed to be a dissection table, still being subjected to that form of torture. The table was really some form of makeshift altar, facing the pool, and right in front of the, big, icy, glowing rock, as if she was an offering to it. The ice obelisk itself glowed positively ethereal, and seemed to show a few cracks along the surface. She had let out a final cry, before being stabbed in the heart by her torturer, and going limp. A few followers had gotten close now, to remove her from the premises, ready to be thrown in the pile.

For a second, she had completely blanked. She had seen torture before, people hung by hooks, impaled and left to rot… raiders did a lot of it, but not this way, not this gruesome malicious, slow carnage. Not with kids. Even raiders wouldn't touch kids like this. Her body had gone numb. "You.. What did you do? What the fuck did you. DO."

She couldn't feel her cheeks, and an increasingly angrier zealot pressed them back against the ground.

"You will learn to not foul Atom's presence with those words, my child, although I suspect you won't last enough for the lesson to be of use." Isolde's eyes shone with every crack of lightning in the sky. "Today is a great honour for you both, heretics. You will suffer to bring back our lord."

She then look at the the guards with malicious glee

"Take them to the altar."

* * *

For a long time… he was nothing.

The brief times in which he was something, or had been something, or suspected he would be something, he had only one sense dominate all others:

Pain

More specifically, hunger.

Insatiable hunger… tearing at his flesh, stripping away his limbs and eating his very malleable body from the inside out, until he could not take it any longer. Then.. darkness.. relief in nothingness, followed by the disappearance of even that last, fleeting feeling.

These moments were rare, and marked his only knowledge of existence.

Then things had changed. In between those moments of pain and nothingness, he had started to have consciousness.

Time didn't feel… meaningful. Everything was groggy, he was awake but.. he wasn't. He wasn't quite sure what it meant to not be awake, because he didn't dream. Every now and then something happened and it would make him feel a bit more like something.. a bit more like someone.. and he would have tiny visions, and then pain would strike him, pain that reminded him about how HUNGRY he was, until he couldn't take it anymore and he would fade. Darkness again, no more consciousness to even understand what had happened. It had been so for very long, but he wasn't sure how long.

It was around this time that he had felt a presence. Something near him, and his stomach had churned as it remembered how to eat. The hunger… he had felt …something feed it. The pain had lessened, in the brief moments he existed, and so he could think.

He had started getting bits, pieces of himself. Small fragments. They didn't make sense together but he was grateful for them. That's when he had felt the worst pain yet. Escaping the void needed energy and that energy was tearing his flesh apart.

In his agony, he had drawn his gaze to that presence. That presence feeding him, but only feeding him scraps. He had begged, in his head, he had screamed. Feed Me. God. It. Hurts. Feed me. Please. I need more.

But the presence had been cruel. Just keeping him awake enough to feel the hunger, but constantly starving, in perennial torture.

Then one day, he had heard screams, but not his own. And his core had pulsed, getting a small taste of something better. Real food. He was too tired, too tortured, to feel anything else but relief.

The presences had multiplied. Each day he would feel more of them, and his pain would lessen. His flesh would stop eating itself, just a bit more. He was too groggy to know what or where or how it was happening, but he knew it was the presences, he knew he was being fed, and he felt no more pain, and so he had fallen into a weary sleep, feeling his core thrum in his chest, gaining back its power.

And he had dreamt, finally. Real dreams of things he barely remembered. Placing him back slowly together, bits and pieces.

And he had heard a voice in one of those dreams, and he had seen a woman, face covered in blood, make deep eye contact with him

There was no conversation between them. Just a trading of intentions, feelings. A connection of souls as they gazed into each other's eyes.

He wanted to know more of himself, to break out whatever this was. To remember. To not be in pain. She was in awe. She was suffering. She wanted to help him. But something felt wrong. Something felt horribly wrong about it.

It had rattled him, and his core had shaken with power.

She had smiled at him.

He had started feeling hesitant about… food. It was no longer relief now he felt deep within him, just a push, a zap of electricity each time. There was no way he couldn't eat, he was just absorbing whatever was out there. He couldn't stop.

And he was starting to feel what was out there. And the more he felt the more it felt wrong, the more his core hummed. The more he remembered things. Who he was. Some flashes of friends he had. Dark hair, Red hat….

Then, in just one day, he had finally heard it. The world outside his own. He had finally felt it. So many presences. All huddled around him. Ecstasy and pain. He felt his core thrum, overjoyed, and then… He heard them scream.

And unlike the first time, he didn't feel relief. He didn't feel the desperate need for food. He'd had enough and now his core was screaming at him too. Screaming that this was wrong. That he had to do something.

But he was trapped. He could only listen, hear… and feed.. No.

He had felt their emotions. Their fear their.. desperation. He had felt the first life being snuffed out. The first presence vanish.

And, ironically as it would seem, he had felt himself bursting with energy. The suffering of others around him had awakened him most primal, most basic urge. The core of his existence, the fuel for his power, his obsession:

To Protect.

A crack had formed at the base of the icy obelisk, the light at its center glowing brighter than ever

2, 4, 8, 10 more lives, snuffed out in front of him. More suffering, more in danger. He could feel the cold of the ice surrounding him now

Screams of young ones, a mother, a glowing green pool of waters mixed with red blood.

More dead. More dead. He had to hurry. His core pulled at his flesh, pressed against his chains in desperation.

One strong presence, brought right before him. Her anguish beyond anything he had ever sensed. Grief stronger than his own. Lost family. Lost time. Death everywhere she looked. It was.. unbearable…

The ice surrounding him felt tight on his flesh, unbreakable. He remembered now: His core fuelled it, made the ice strong, unable to melt. But he had to break through. He had to. He needed to. His core would rip him apart if he didn't.

With the power of a burning sun, he channelled himself whole, channelled himself through his newfound lungs, screaming, wailing.

"ENOUGH"

* * *

Nora Couldn't believe this was the end of the line for her. Nick lay next to her, his weary yellow eyes flickering. Beginning to turn off. They couldn't torture an old synth like him the way they did a human, but they had pulled some dumb electrical device that had fizzled his circuits, and at this point the man was.. unresponsive. Her friend. No. Her most important friend. The one who kept her alive. Her lifeline. He was fading off before her blurred vision.

She was loosing blood. She knew that, after all, that spiked whip wasn't there just to bruise. They were standing among dozens of corpses, it made sense where this torture was gonna end. She had tried her best to resist, but there were too many of em, and for every two she punched a third would strike her back. They had gagged her to stop her sailor's mouth from sullying the ritual, and told her to be thankful, since she would've probably needed something to sink her teeth into.

Tears had mixed with blood as she had seen Isolde approach, with a sacrificial knife, the same she had seen used earlier. She had thrashed, trying to headbutt, kick, scrape the ones holding her, yelling through the cloth muzzle about how she was going to break out and put a bullet right through Isolde's brains, then piss on her grave. Fucking shit. Damnit. She wasn't going to let herself and Nick go down without a fight

Isolde had raised her knife, then plunged. It was at that moment that Nora had released one hand from one of the 2 zealots holding her in a burst of strength, pure adrenaline, and blocked the knife with her own palm, slicing it open in the process.

One of the zealots holding her had tried to move her arm back in place but she had used the diverted focus to bite him right in the neck, drawing blood. The spray or arterial fluid was enough of a distraction to pull off her other arm, grab Isolde's knife by the handle and stab the blade right through the second zealot's eye socket.

Then pain had stopped her. That electric device they used on Nick, one of the zealots had just tazed her. She had blacked out for for a few seconds, and it was a few seconds too late. Isolde had grabbed the knife and was plunging again. She had raised both her arms and grasped at the hilt, her strength against the other, fighting for her life. The blade inching, closer and closer, to her neck, a searing spectacle of cracking ice and light and buzzing energies behind the good Mother, one she couldn't pay any attention to.

Her strength waned

'Forgive me Nate. For… Forgive me Shaun'

The knife drew blood.

Boom

* * *

A shockwave of air, light, and crystal shards traveled through the crater, shattering eardrums, knocking everyone, everything back, and lifting a huge cloud of dust and white powder up into the air surrounding it.

Isolde was missing, her knife had fallen on the ground next to Nora. By some miracle, it hadn't made its way straight into her neck.

Nora had jerked herself up, her ears ringing. She had spit blood, trying to pace herself in the dust. She couldn't see more than 10 feet in front of her, but she could recognize Nick's eyes glow anywhere. She had stumbled to his body, ripping out her gag in the process.

"Come on Nick. Get up Partner. We're lucky today."

Nick's eyes had buzzed, and moved erratically. His voice kept glitching.

".. G G G … Get my y y. Cerebral U it b aaaa ck in pl e"

Nora had thankfully known exactly what Nick meant. He realized the back of Nick's head was wide open. Wires streaming out of it, into a microchip panel lying in the dust not too far away. Those assholes needed a special kind of hell made for them. She would be happy to provide.

She had grabbed the piece and put it back. It had slid in easy, like a fitting puzzle piece.

"Successful Reintegration. System Booting. Please Wait"

She had exhaled, barely feeling her lungs. Nick wasn't dead. Nick wasn't dead. God she. She couldn't breathe.

That's when she had felt the cold touch of flakes touch her. White flakes, descending slowly, gently. She hadn't seen this in a long time. It was snow.

She had turned her head, feeling a cold shiver behind her back, and she had seen a silhouette in the dust and snow. A silhouette with piercing, burning green eyes.

Grabbing a railgun from the nearest dead zealot, she had grasped tightly onto Nick's carcass, covering his own glowing eyes and mouth as much as she could. She was shaking, her vision foggy from the blood loss. She could almost feel the minor radiation poisoning seep into her through the snow.

She waited still for her partner to boot. For the dust to settle. For the green eyed monster to ignore her through the fog, and look the other way


End file.
